William F. Tompkins

William Freeman Tompkins Sr. (April 4, 1812 – August 17, 1871) was an American farmer, businessman, politician, and Wisconsin pioneer. He served two terms in the Wisconsin State Assembly, representing the city of Janesville in the 1850 and 1851 sessions. He was also one of the first proprietors of the Janesville Gazette. He served in elected office as a Whig but after the dissolution of that party, he joined the Democratic Party. He was described as an extremist for temperance, and the "Father of Temperance in Rock County".

Biography William Freeman Tompkins was born April 4, 1812, at Scipio, New York. His mother died shortly after his birth and his father died only a few years later.

Tompkins emerged in the Wisconsin Territory in the mid-1840s, as a politically active Whig, running for probate judge in 1844. He was unsuccessful in 1844, but won election as probate judge the next year, in 1845.

Just after winning re-election to the Assembly, Tompkins was one of the founders of the Rock County Agricultural Society and one of its original officers.

After the Whig Party dissolved in the mid-1850s, Tompkins joined the Democratic Party. He went bankrupt during the American Civil War and left Wisconsin, ultimately moving to Abilene, Kansas, where he died in 1871.

Personal life and family William F. Tompkins was the last of seven children born to William Tompkins and his wife Anna ( Freeman).

On February 25, 1834, William F. Tompkins married Caroline Leach at Fleming, New York. They had four children together, though one daughter died in childhood. Their eldest son, Horace, enrolled in the Union Army in the American Civil War and served as a second lieutenant in the 19th Michigan Infantry Regiment. He was a prisoner of war for several years in Libby Prison, he died of disease at Nashville, Tennessee, in the final days of the war.